ISI pumps several crores to revive militancy in J&K

4th April 1999Daily Excelsior

NEW DELHI: The Inter-Services Intelligence of
(ISI) Pakistan is again trying to stoke the embers of
militancy in Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, has even targeted
peaceful Himachal Pradesh by pumping in the fortunes
earned from poppy trade and was also attempting to create
a communal wedge in Jammu and Doda areas, Home Ministry
sources said here today.

Quoting interrogation
reports of some recently arrested militants, the sources
said, the ISI with the active support of Pakistani Army,
plans to heighten militant activities in both the states
and has targeted nomads in the higher reaches of Himachal
Pradesh.

Bouyed with huge profits
from poppy cultivation in Pak-Afghan border, ISI was
ready to pump in several crores to revive the dying
militancy, the sources quoted a Pak-based arrested
militant, Shamas-ul-Haq, resident of Balochistan, as
having confessed.

The sources said
Lashker-e-Toiba militants had also been asked to move
into the higher reaches of Jammu to foment communal
trouble in the region and increase their presence along
the Indo-Pak border.

However, ISI has directed
the militants to refrain from shooting in public and take
utmost care not to invite public wrath, they quoted
another militant, Bashir Ahmed, as saying. The ISI has
also directed militants to target Jammu city after
establishing bases in the two states, Ahmed was quoted by
the sources.

The militants have claimed
that a number of Darasgahs (Islamic schools)
have been set up in Chamba and Kangra Valley of Himachal
Pradesh where militants take refuge after sneaking into
the state, they said, adding large scale infiltration was
also taking place from Reasi, Poonch and Rajouri with an
eye on Jammu.

ISI has asked Afghan
warlords to train the ultras as it was becoming
increasingly difficult for the Pakistani Army to do so in
view of mounting international pressure, they said.

The regular Army has been
staying away from the training camps along the Line of
Control (LoC) which have been converted into transit
camps to shift extremists to North West Frontier Province
(NWFP) in Pakistan for training, the sources said.

A recently arrested
militant, code-named Sikander, told the authorities that
the camps along LOC including Gadi Habib, Nowshera,
Nowsada, Kotla and Bimber have now been made transit
camps for shifting ultras to attack in NWFP to be trained
in basic and jungle warfare by Afghans, they said.

These jungle warfare
tactics, according to Sikandar, were adopted following
the directive of ISI to militants operating in Jammu and
Kashmir to shift to the virgin peaks of neighbouring
Himachal Pradesh, according to the reports.

The arrested militants
asserted the ISI was not able to play the religion card
anymore with the Afghan youth as some of them on return
from Kashmir had praised India for its secular policies,
the sources said.

Faced with serious
depletion in the ranks of insurgents, isi also adopted
another strategy of recruiting unemployed Afghan youth by
force to fight in Kashmir, they said.

Several foreign
mercenaries who were arrested recently have confessed
that they had ventured into Pakistan for a job, where
they fell prey to ISI agents who lured them to training
camps located in NWFP.

They said a majority of
Afghan youths forcibly trained at ISI-managed training
camps prefer to surrender at the border. (PTI)